


Five Things Integra Hellsing Has Prayed For

by Miri Cleo (miri_cleo)



Category: Hellsing
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-16
Updated: 2008-09-16
Packaged: 2017-10-01 23:22:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/89
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/miri_cleo/pseuds/Miri%20Cleo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five double drabbles; five things Integra Hellsing has prayed for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Things Integra Hellsing Has Prayed For

**Author's Note:**

> Hellsing, it's concepts and characters, belong to Hirano Kouta.

When Integra knelt, she was careful not to catch her skirt under her knees and crease it, careful not to scuff the toes of her shoes on the stones of the floor.  The Hellsing chapel was quiet; she could hear her father’s breathing.  His elbow brushed hers, a small comfort in the dim room that seemed limitlessly filled with shadows.  She folded her hands as she had been taught and began to pray, also as she had been taught.  Her lips moved soundlessly, forming each careful word.

_Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.  They kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.  Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.  And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.  For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory forever._

_And God bless the queen.  God bless Papa.  God bless Hellsing and Walter and all those less fortunate than us._

_Amen._

  
Integra peeked up at her father when she finished.  His head was bowed and his eyes still closed.  She wondered how he could have so much to say.

*****

Integra clutched the sheets of her father’s bed as she knelt.  She twisted them in her hands as if that would stop the tears from wetting her cheeks and splattering the lenses of her glasses.  She could hear her father’s breathing, though it was shallow and faint.  When he began to cough, she bit her bottom to lip to keep from crying out.

_Dear God, please let him live._

She repeated each voiceless word again and again until she was whispering them into the sheets.  The floor was cold underneath her knees, and her father’s coughing quieted.  They were both still.  The room, the house—all still.

 Integra let her head sink to the bed.  She did not smooth her skirt, did not brush her hair away from her eyes.  Her fingers slacked but remained clasped as she began to doze.  The priest had already come, but she thought if she continued to pray, to believe hard enough, it would not be too late.

_Dear God, please...please let him live._

She continued the prayer even as she began to dream, until he coughed again.  Her knees were stiff, and when she looked at her father’s pale and sunken face, her tears began again.

_Why, God?  Why?_

*****

The cathedral was cold; shafts of light illuminated the alter and the aisles, but Integra saw on the shadows that remained.  She knelt, careful not to crease her trousers, her fingers clasped together in pristine white gloves.  When she bowed her head, her hair fell over her shoulders, hiding her face.

 All around her there was the hushed noise of shuffling feet, of whispered awe.  The sound of Evensong was as distant as a breath, and Integra found it hard to find a place of solitude even in her own mind.

  
She kept her lips drawn into a taut line as she prayed

_Forgive me; forgive Hellsing and continue to give it your blessing.  Forgive me the methods in which I must carry out the will of the Queen and the will of the Church.  By your infinite grace and mercy, forgive me.  And give me the strength to continue.  _

_I have pledged myself to this.  I gave my father my word, the queen my word.  I gave my truth to them and to you.  I have remained chaste, but blood has been spilled at my command.  I have spilled blood in your name.  Forgive me; continue to give me strength, by your grace._

*****

Integra understood why her father’s prayers always seemed so long, why he had so much to say.  There was country, and there was God; even they could not be wholly separate, and there was room for little else.  She prayed ceaselessly, even in her rage, even in her coldest moments.

Her prayers were silent, calculated as she moved through the halls of her home.  With each man, with each bullet, she said the same small prayer.  They had no breath left in them, and she felt her blood run cold with rage.

Yet, Integra felt if she were to speak it, her voice might quiver.  She would not have that.  The Valentine brothers left her with only the skeleton of an organization, but they would not leave her without her resolve.  Her hand was steady, her prayer constant.  She knew that little could save the souls of her men, but she prayed as she had been taught to do.

God have mercy on their souls. 

Her steps were measured in the quiet.  The moonlight lengthened her shadow.

_God forgive me.  God give me the strength to rid the world of this abomination to y_our name.  God give their souls eternal rest.  God forgive me.

*****

Integra’s own breathing filled her ears until all seemed quiet.  She watched, horrified as he began to disappear, as he faded to nothing but shadow only to become nothing at all.  She shouted her orders, but she could not even hear her own agonized voice.

The air was still around her and her skin was cold.  She gripped her blade, hands clasped in bloodied gloves.  The blood—all that was left of him—seemed to be drying, and a scrap of his tie hung alone.  The moment stretched outside of time.

Integra waited.  She waited for him to return, for a thousand eyes to appear in a red sky.  She waited for Baskerville to leap from the drying signet.  But nothing came.  She felt cold with disbelief, with rage. 

Though the Major spoke, Integra did not hear it.  The sound was distant to her—too distant to penetrate her thoughts.  She did not bow her head or close her eyes.  Her limbs were rigid and her eyes narrowed.  Light reflected from her glasses; her shadow grew behind her.

It was real; he was gone.  The sounds that continued around Integra came to her first in a dull roar.  But she began to hear them more clearly, more sharply.  But not above her own brief prayer.

_God forgive me the monster._


End file.
